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KDE 4.10 Will Support Menu Buttons In The Title Bar

01-14-2013, 09:50 AM

Phoronix: KDE 4.10 Will Support Menu Buttons In The Title Bar

A number of interesting features have been merged into KDE's KWin compositing window manager for the next KDE release. One of the features just added is support for merging the menu buttons into the menu/title bar, in order to save vertical screen real estate...

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I never understood the recent push to title bar buttons. If we were using 800x600 resolution displays, then sure, it would be important, but now... Well, I suppose more choices don't hurt. Hopefully it won't be on by default, though.

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I never understood the recent push to title bar buttons. If we were using 800x600 resolution displays, then sure, it would be important, but now... Well, I suppose more choices don't hurt. Hopefully it won't be on by default, though.

I see what you mean but screens are getting wider, not taller. Its been I don't know how many years since 800x600 monitors were released (hell its been over 10 years since 1024x768 monitors were common) yet the average PC hasn't gained more than 500 pixels in the Y axis while many reach over 1000 in X. People are also multitasking more these days, where title bars along side menus are just extra clutter. As another point to make, phones and many tablets have poor screen resolutions where if you were to run linux on them, those extra 28 pixels or so make a difference. With screens getting so wide these days, there's beginning to be a lot of empty space in the title bar which can kinda give a "useless" feel to it.

What I think would be interesting is a plugin that does a crude ribbon bar. I know a lot of people hate it (I used to myself) but there are points where it is more handy than a standard menu. Since this would be automatic for every program, it obviously can't be as dynamic and feature rich as a ribbon that was made intentionally but it should be easily doable.

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I never understood the recent push to title bar buttons. If we were using 800x600 resolution displays, then sure, it would be important, but now... Well, I suppose more choices don't hurt. Hopefully it won't be on by default, though.

It's not on by default, the option lies in "System Settings" -> "Application Appearance" -> "Fine Tuning" -> set last drop box to "Title bar button".

The option looks very nice. Most KDE apps have the most important functions in the navigation bar, making the menus useless most of the time. This option just puts the menus in a drop down menu when you click on the button in the window decoration of that window. I feel it's a very clever use of appmenu (versus having a global menu-bar).

Another new option is to have the menu autohide until you put the mouse on the top of the screen (sort of like a panel set to autohide).

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I see what you mean but screens are getting wider, not taller. Its been I don't know how many years since 800x600 monitors were released (hell its been over 10 years since 1024x768 monitors were common) yet the average PC hasn't gained more than 500 pixels in the Y axis while many reach over 1000 in X. People are also multitasking more these days, where title bars along side menus are just extra clutter. As another point to make, phones and many tablets have poor screen resolutions where if you were to run linux on them, those extra 28 pixels or so make a difference. With screens getting so wide these days, there's beginning to be a lot of empty space in the title bar which can kinda give a "useless" feel to it.

What I think would be interesting is a plugin that does a crude ribbon bar. I know a lot of people hate it (I used to myself) but there are points where it is more handy than a standard menu. Since this would be automatic for every program, it obviously can't be as dynamic and feature rich as a ribbon that was made intentionally but it should be easily doable.

It's still more than enough. The standard PC screens are 1920x1080 or 1920x1200. Laptop screens are 1366x768, yes, but even then I don't see many people complaining about those few pixels. If they were, they would put their taskbars on the side of the screen (which I have done on my tablet PC, but then it's due to the fact that the items there are easier to access more than anything else). I also don't see how that impacts multi-tasking, as people usually tile windows side-by-side when they do that, and thus they worry about horizontal, and not vertical space more. Plus, that's why we have virtual desktops. As for phones, sure, but phones don't run KDE to begin with.

Crude ribbon bars already exist, they are called icon bars with adjustable height. Not all programs support that (oddly enough), but at least those that use KDE UIs have it:

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It's still more than enough. The standard PC screens are 1920x1080 or 1920x1200. Laptop screens are 1366x768, yes, but even then I don't see many people complaining about those few pixels. If they were, they would put their taskbars on the side of the screen (which I have done on my tablet PC, but then it's due to the fact that the items there are easier to access more than anything else). I also don't see how that impacts multi-tasking, as people usually tile windows side-by-side when they do that, and thus they worry about horizontal, and not vertical space more. Plus, that's why we have virtual desktops. As for phones, sure, but phones don't run KDE to begin with.

Those are the industry standard and the average screen size of new displays but most computers still operate below 1680x1050. People don't put task bars on the side because that becomes very inconvenient and takes up more space than it does on the bottom. Not even many linux DEs can do it right, but Mac can and I've seen plenty of people who put their dock on the side.
I agree about the virtual desktops, but unfortunately not everyone uses them even when they have the option.

Crude ribbon bars already exist, they are called icon bars with adjustable height. Not all programs support that (oddly enough), but at least those that use KDE UIs have it:

That's not a ribbon bar, that's just a toolbar with icons. Ribbon bars are supposed to reflect the drop down menus they replace. Submenus would just become distinct categories.